Dark Summit: The True Story of Everest's Most Controversial Season - Hardcover

Heil, Nick

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0307356426 ISBN 13: 9780307356420

Publisher: Random House Canada, 2008

Synopsis

In the tradition of Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air, Nick Heil recounts the harrowing story of the deadly and controversial 2006 climbing season on Everest.

In early May 2006, a young British climber named David Sharp lay dying near the top of Mount Everest while forty other climbers walked past him on their way to the summit. A week later, Lincoln Hall, a seasoned Australian climber, was left for dead near the same spot. Hall’s death was reported around the world, but the next day he was found alive after spending the night on the upper mountain with no food and no shelter.

If David Sharp’s death was shocking, it was not singular: despite unusually good weather, ten others died attempting to reach the summit that year. In this meticulous inquiry into what went wrong, Nick Heil tells the full story of the deadliest year on Everest since the infamous season of 1996. He introduces Russell Brice, the outfitter who has done more than anyone to provide access to the summit via the mountain’s north side–and who some believe was partially responsible for Sharp’s death. As more climbers attempt the summit each year, Heil shows how increasingly risky expeditions and unscrupulous outfitters threaten to turn Everest into a deadly circus.

Written by an experienced climber and outdoor writer, Dark Summit is both a riveting account of a notorious climbing season and a troubling investigation into whether the pursuit of the ultimate mountaineering prize has spiralled out of control.

About this title

About the Author

Nick Heil first wrote about the 2006 climbing season for Outside, where he worked as a senior editor from 1999 to 2006. Now a freelance journalist, his work has also appeared in Men’s Journal, Skiing, and other publications. Based in Santa Fe, he has worked as a climbing and skiing instructor, and has travelled extensively in Europe, Asia and North America.

From Booklist

The year 2006 recorded Mount Everest’s deadliest season on record since 1996 (the killer season that spawned Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air). To tell the story of the 2006 season, which made global headlines due to the troubling circumstances surrounding the death of a climber, journalist Heil, a climber himself, gives us extensive background (more than half the book is a prologue to the 2006 season, and while the backstory will be pertinent to aficionados, it may prove frustrating to those waiting for the real story). There is plenty of fascinating material here, especially the excellent profiles of the key players (including flamboyant Russell Brice, Everest’s most successful commercial operator, a larger-than-life figure who seems to belong on a movie screen), but as a chronicle of the mountain’s “most controversial season,” the book feels padded, as though the author felt he had only enough material for a long article. Recommend this one to mountaineering devotees only, but don’t expect it to attract the kind of general audience that found Krakauer. --David Pitt

Edition details

• Publisher: Random House Canada
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0307356426
• ISBN 13: 9780307356420
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288